Written by weiganla on Thursday, April 17, 2008

Review: Astraware Hexic Spins Me In Circles

I’ve always liked hexagons. They’re like squares, only more interesting. Why are more shapes in our lives not based on hexagons? I mean, bees figured it out, and I always thought we were smarter than they are. After all, we play puzzle games.

Speaking of smart people, have you heard of Alexey Pajitnov? You may not know the name, but I guarantee he is responsible for taking hours off your life. He invented a little thing called Tetris. I have fond memories of my Windows 3.1 computer that was so primitive it didn’t even have an Internet connection. It ate floppy disks. If it grunted it could handle word processing. But it did come with two games: Freecell and Tetris. After my win streak got into the 50s, Freecell started to get old. Tetris, though — there was always a high score to beat, especially since my mother was better than I was.

Most puzzle games bore me pretty quickly. Phrases like "wildly addictive" get thrown around a lot, and aside from admiring the catchy wording, I rarely understand it. However, I’ve just admitted to a weakness for hexagons and for Alexey Pajitnov, who didn’t stop after Tetris — Hexic (and Mozaki, review coming soon!) is also his creation. Hexic is essentially a cousin of Bejeweled with different geometry. The goal is to rotate clusters of three hexagons to create color-matched trios.

Does Hexic live up to its pedigree? Read on to find out!

Getting Started

Installation and registration is easy as pie. Just get the game on your Pocket PC either through the desktop installer or the CAB file, then unlock it by entering your registration code through the menu on the main screen. Next, make sure you’ve got a full battery — just a friendly word of advice.

Astraware’s Hexic is based on the popular MSN Games version. There are three modes: Marathon, Timed, and Survival. Yeah, every puzzle game has multiple modes — it’s practically a law. Most of the time you play the basic mode and ignore the rest that are sitting there wasting space. With Hexic, though, each mode is different enough to justify its existence, and more than that, all three of them are good.

Marathon Mode

This is probably the best place to familiarize yourself with gameplay. It’s just you and a field of pretty tiles. See the highlighted group of two reds and a blue in the screenshot? Tapping on the center of that group will make it pivot, in this case clockwise because that is the direction chosen at the upper left. If the game detects a cluster of three of more hexes of the same color formed during the spin, the cluster disappears, you get points, and new hexes appear at the top to refill the field. If the group spins all the way around, then nothing happens and you feel sheepish.

If you say that sounds kind of dull, I heartily agree. But there’s more. As you accumulate points and move to higher levels, other pieces such as stars and bombs appear. The special pieces can save your bacon or put your back against a wall, but they definitely liven up gameplay.

What really stands out about Marathon Mode is that the object is to win. Yes, it’s a puzzle game with an endpoint other than a high score! The catch is that winning is very — I repeat, very — difficult.

Creating a "flower" of hexes, with six pieces of the same color ringed around a center, earns you a silver starflower. Do I have to mention this is harder than it sounds? If you manage to make a flower using starflowers, you earn a Black Pearl. Then Jack Sparrow appears and the game is over! If only. Nope, you have to create a cluster or flower using Black Pearls to win and end the game.

To have a prayer of accomplishing this feat, you’ll need to deploy more strategy than a chess grandmaster. "Easy to learn, hard to master" may be a cliche, but it definitely applies here.

Timed Mode

Playing Hexic with a timer turns a peaceful puzzle game into something for the adrenaline junkie in all of us. Gameplay is the same, and it’s even still theoretically possible to win with Black Pearls. (Good luck with that.) Only now you have a timer counting down, just itching to knock you out if a bomb doesn’t explode on you first.

The time is displayed numerically at the top of the screen, but Astraware has fortunately realized that you’ll be too frantic to look at that. Instead, turquoise globes to the right of the field dim sequentially to inform you of how close you are to a Game Over. You can build up the timer by making clusters, but you lose time with useless moves. If by some miracle you manage to earn a starflower, the timer resets.

Survival Mode

The last mode is the most unusual, and it turned out to be my favorite. This is where the Tetris branch of the family tree becomes apparent. Unlike in the other two modes, pieces are not replaced when clusters disappear. You just keep going until there are no more clusters you can make. Everything left is locked for the next round, meaning that it can’t rotate. You can still use locked pieces to form clusters and flowers, and there are special tricks for freeing locked hexes.

The game ends when you manage to lock up the whole screen, or when you survive through 50 levels. Coincidentally, 50 levels of Survival Mode almost exactly equals the time my Axim’s battery will go without getting very cranky at me. It’s a good thing the game stops then, or I probably would have discovered what happens when I run the battery completely out.

Graphics and Audio

With the metallic accents, the subtle honeycomb background, and the glassy effects that give dimension to the hexes, Hexic’s graphics are undeniably gorgeous. The colors are perfectly chosen to be visually pleasant even during long sessions. Animation for the falling and turning hexes is also smooth as silk. Meanwhile, the in-game music is relaxing and unobtrusive while fitting seamlessly with the mood of the game. Although the gameplay is fun by itself, the presentation lifts Hexic to another level.

Conclusion

Hexic is a terrific game in an impressively sleek package. Even if you’re not a puzzle gaming fan, with three great modes of play stacked on an absorbing premise, Hexic deserves a spot on your device. If a cynic like me can run down her battery on it, chances are you’ll find it wildly addictive.